July 2001
2001-02 Freehling Scholars
Graeme Dinwoodie
Professor of Law
Nancy Marder
Associate Professor of Law
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The Chicago-Kent community congratulates Professors
Graeme Dinwoodie and Nancy Marder on their recent appointments as
Freehling Scholars. The Paul Freehling Scholarship Fund was established
in 1990, through the support of the the Norman and Edna Freehling
Endowment Fund, to promote the writings of Chicago-Kent professors
who have distinguished themselves in their respective fields through
substantial and sustained scholarship.
Professors Graeme Dinwoodie and Nancy Marder specialize
in very different areas of the law: Professor Dinwoodie considers
how nations protect intellectual property rights worldwide, and
Professor Marder focuses on how the American jury system can be
improved. But one thing these professors have in common is that
they both write on how societal changes and new technologies affect
their respective fields.
Through his scholarly work, Professor Dinwoodie aims to distill
and clarify the ever more complex issues in international intellectual
property law. "Works are increasingly being created, exploited
and infringed in more than one country, partly because of the Internet
but more generally because of globalization," he says. "Policymakers
have to develop international approaches to what they previously
addressed nationally."
Day to day, practitioners in international intellectual property
law must remain focused on the operation of specific regulations,
laws and treaties: for instance, the pharmaceutical company attorney
concerned with lax laws in different countries that do not effectively
prohibit the copying of its patented products or that facilitate
the distribution of generic equivalents trading on the goodwill
of a branded drug. As a scholar, Dinwoodie has the freedom to study
broader issues, like the nature of the World Trade Organization's
authority to circumscribe those national laws.
"Like everyone, I'm interested in a range of substantive issues,"
says Dinwoodie, "but I'm also interested in the quasi-procedural
lawmaking issues that cut across all substantive international intellectual
property issues."
Dinwoodie intends to use the sabbatical semester that accompanies
the Freehling Scholarship to focus on writing a monograph on the
politics of the development of international intellectual property
law. "The monograph is something I really couldn't do without
the scholarship sabbatical," he says. "What would have
been a project scattered over several summers is something to which
I can now devote a substantial, concentrated block of time."
While Professor Dinwoodie addresses wide-ranging international
issues, Professor Marder examines jurors and juries--the most local
and fundamental elements of the U.S. legal system.
Because juries are temporary groups of average citizens with little
or no experience inside a courtroom, jurors generally cannot--or
do not know how to--represent their own interests during court proceedings.
Without someone to champion new options, such as videotaping jury
instructions for use during deliberations or allowing jurors to
take notes during the course of a trial, courts often resist them
in favor of the status quo.
"Jurors are not in the position to advocate for themselves,"
explains Marder. "My perspective has always been that of the
jury. One has to be in academia to take that view."
Through her scholarship and numerous speaking engagements, Marder
hopes to raise awareness among attorneys and judges about the challenges
that jurors face. One of her current interests centers on how technology
can become a tool for the jury. "Very few people seem to be
thinking about jurors and how technology can serve them," she
says.
Marder plans to use her sabbatical semester to work
on her forthcoming book, Jury
Process, part of the Turning Point Series,
whose authors are nominated based on their scholarly
renown and mastery of their subject areas. The book
will take a comprehensive look at the U.S. jury system
and the issues facing it today.
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